I take another step back. “So what now?” I’m stalling for time. “What did the bones tell you about how this ends?”

My eyes flick to where a bone-carved sword rests on a high shelf, and a ping of alarm goes through me—it looks familiar. Latham follows my gaze. Takes a step toward the weapon. Runs a slender finger over the bone-carved hilt.

“Come here, Saskia.”

I try to remember the details of my nightmare—the quality of the light in the room. Bright colors, and weapons made of bone. Where I’m always standing when the sword falls. The details are hauntingly similar.

I swallow. “I think I’ll stay where I am.”

His hand drops back to his side. He leaves the sword where it is.

“Aren’t you tired, Saskia?” He asks the question softly, almost tenderly. And it nearly breaks me. Because I am. I’m so, so tired. Is that it then? I’m so exhausted that I simply give up? No. I refuse to choose that path.

“I’m not too tired for justice,” I say.

He gives me an evaluating look. “Justice? I think you mean revenge.”

“In this case, they’re the same.”

“Are they? You’d choose vengeance over seeing your mother again? When it would be so easy to bring her back? I must confess, I’m astonished. I had no idea you were so cold.”

Even though I know he’s trying to manipulate my emotions, I’m still stunned by how effective he is. The thought of abandoning my mother forever when there is any other option—it feels like vinegar poured over an open wound. I make an involuntary sound, and I can see that it pleases him.

“You never found your mother’s bones.” His tone is light. Conversational. “It was important to you.”

It was more than important to me. It was vital. And the reminder of my failure is a vice around my heart.

“Perhaps you didn’t know where to look.” His fingers trail lazily across the weapons on the shelf—bone knives, arrows, throwing stars.

Beside me, Bram reaches into the pouch at his side. I hear the snap of a small bone, but nothing happens.

“Would you like to know what I did with them?”

My voice sticks in my throat.

It’s a game, a trick. I think of Latham’s question months ago. Would you like to embrace your mother one final time?

And my answer. A tight whisper. Yes.

But the moment she reached me, he stabbed her in the back. So now I clamp my lips shut even though I want to answer, long to beg him to tell me.

“No?” he says. “Not even a little curious?”